"ITEM! A press release was sent out to the usual suspects last week promoting the Markosia book "Lazarus: Immortal Coils."

Jim Valentino of Image wasn't happy and replied to all about the similarities to Image's current "Lazarus" title, bccing in Diamond Comics representatives.

The creators were bemused, considering they'd danced this dance last year, from the other perspective, when they'd announced their Lazarus book, to find Image about to publish a similarly named title. At the time Jim Valentino suggested the title change... one he seemed to have forgotten by the time their press release came round."

I can't believe an Image Founder is cock blocking new guys just starting out.

I went to their myspace page, saw the preview, cool stuff, check it out - www.myspace.com/10_worlds_studio

The way I see it, if a company A is making product Y, and another company tries to sell them something similar, lets call it product y, which is obviously a copy of product Y, and company A says "WTF BBQ, no we cannot take this!" it's because they're protecting Product Y's value, and themselves. Don't want to glut the market, and if everything is Y or a variation thereof, people might get confused, and buy less of Y, making its value drop, or they might get ticked off if they end up with y when expecting Y.

Now, when people B who proposed y to company A see their project rejected, they, of course, feel hurt. But rejections aren't meant (to my understanding) to be personal, and company A has to take care of itself and it's current employees, workers and product lines before taking on more stuff, doing the whole running a business and not 'we take in all your orphans' shindig. B takes this personally, goes WAHHHHHHH, which basically proves company A was right in rejecting y, as B has proved themselves not really up to acting like grownups in a business situation; this is NOT saying B lacks quality in product, just that they lack maturity, and originality, as well as knowledge of how businesses work.

It doesn't mean A is out to get little people like B. It means that A has an understanding of the business and markets, and wants good employees to produce damn spiffy products. If you're going to send stuff to a company, shouldn't you make sure your stuff doesn't clash with or overlap too much with already created products?

That about it? (Note: I haven't checked out the sources YET). And I think Lazarus is a cool title. I had a fish named Lazarus once. Alas, he did not rise from the dead, after committing a fishy suicide by jumping out of his tank.